The popularity of portable computing devices has fueled the demand for wireless networking solutions. A multitude of wireless networking standards now exist, and others are in development, that each set up a framework for the operation of a wireless network. Many of these standards utilize the same or similar portions of the electromagnetic spectrum as other standards. Some new wireless networking standards provide for the simultaneous use of a particular channel by devices following different standards. Typically, these newer standards will include some form of “protection mechanism” to support this simultaneous use by disparate devices. However, such protection mechanisms may carry a performance penalty that reduces the efficiency with which the available spectrum is utilized.